Public domain
resurrected starlight invents cinema
erotic imagination projections
on larger than life screens
mimetic art form
redefining life
and its observation
illusion of motion
cut scene magic
within the festival of lights
beacon of ideas
revolutionizing societies
auteurs of phantom rides
ghost images to
ignite ethical compassion
unveil humanity
close up transitions
create natural intimacy
resonate with voyeurs
audience insights blooming
with the actor’s realization
wide eyed neo-language
its adepts infusing images
with eros, editing the story,
expanding the possible
in a radius defined by aperture
limited and standardized by
35 millimeter film gauge
establishing shots for a new history
intercuts surpassing theater
fragmented space of interiority
conceptual leaps create
sublime, psychological enigmas
human counterparts enacting
the lifecycle of stars
nebulas, supernovas, and black holes,
hype, fame and tragedy
grace, luxury, and sexual tension
in rapturous movie palaces
atmospheric colors heightening
glamour birthed by shape-shifting
purveyors of fantasies,
Hollywood lawbreakers
studio sets creating reality
scrubbing the world clean
of the marginalized
contrasted by dissidents slicing
an eye, a suggestive sea urchin
burning in lava flows of psychosis
yet its legacy lies instead
in the fundamentally humanizing
activity of poetic arcs:
in desperation a young girl
ties leaves to branches to save her sister
from a death foretold when they fall
an intruder stumbles upon an
abused wife, humbling the husband
and helps her fractured self become whole
a bereaved mother cannot
bear the sight of a family of mice
killed by the neighbor’s cat
as an orchestra must disband
its cellist becomes an undertaker,
Shinto ritual bearer for the dead
a grieving widower travels across
the world to engage
Butoh and finds peace
angels bear witness to the trials
of the living, recording their lives until one
becomes mortal from an abundance of love
an aging couple visiting their grown children
find them too busy, leaving their wellbeing
in the hands of a widowed daughter-in-law
through the poetry of these films,
drifting pictures, thoughts, and experiences
we arrive at the carnival of arts
light captured to illuminate our inner worlds
showing us how to love, mourn, and grow,
to spin art from the raw materials of our lives
it is amazing sometimes the depth of feeling you can get from a well told story and how we will attach to certain movies…and what moves us….and each of us a bit different with the same movie…but it can inspire us, stir up, make us angry…bring out that which we keep hidden deep within…
I enjoyed your style! 🙂
I love how you contrast the hard technology terms with the softness of biology…and love. Somewhere there is where fantasy lies which is the material of films.. great poetry that really draw me in with all those little stories tied together like a pearl necklace…
Epic in scale, but still very focused; miss you around the pub, Anna. Hope you are busy & can see you’re still productive. Hope you are keeping up with my new Cinemagenic series BLACKTHORNE; gosh, can’t find you on Twitter anymore; update the dVerse Bio possibly.
Wish i could do that.
So much great stuff here.
Excellent read.>KB
i think this movie theater is on fire.
you changed your name! i guess you got married(?) congratulations! or maybe you didn’t get married but changed your name anyway, congratulations either way!
i always think in terms of motion pictures when i write poetry, where is the camera in this scene? in close or wide out? what are my lighting elements? how can i get rid of the dialog and get the story thru objects and movement? how do i capture the true relationships of objects and movements and get to the true experience and emotion? so on and so forth. seems really silly but that’s what i do. i only admit it now because you went to all the trouble to write this… and its on fire
The carnival of arts, yes, that is it, exactly. A well-made film, just like a good book, has the ability to show us something of life we’ve never seen before. Like all art, we are moved by what touches us. Your words are their very own carnival, their very own art. And always, they move me.
carnival is right, for sure! a real burst of BOOM in the thunder of it all blowing up! such an energy and the passion is clear to see, or more of a feeling in the reading of the BURST!!!
not sure how much sense that actually makes as a comment
but it does describe how I feel about your PO – perfectly 🙂
beacon of ideas
revolutionizing societies
auteurs of phantom rides
for me, film is the highest art form and directors, particular a select group of auteurs,
are the greatest artists because of the combined skill set required and the impact a
classic can have because of the range within the experience, the depth of the encounter.
I have always respected and admired your depth of knowledge to and the solidity
or rigour of your delivery. You always bring experiment and technical language
into the mainstream because it emanates from the love of what you are creating
and this love and energy is present, felt and whooooooshed!
I exit through the same door
with a bit of
POW! 🙂
thanks anna
take care x
Love this one. A tribute to screen art, the interactions between movie (story, actor, camera view/angle) and watcher, the magic and art form that can sometimes leave a lasting impression.
this is very cool anna… i love how they create scenes and moods and manage to make it meaningful to us…meeting us on that emotional level… that’s what art does – no matter if it’s painting or writing or movie making or even ads
A cool piece, Anna. Films move us and inspire us in wonderful ways.
Instead of going through the looking glass, instead we move toward the camera through the lens past the set and into the film itself – moving always past the technology (yet still aware of it) into those unbelievable movie palaces and like Woody Allen’s PURPLE ROSE OF CAIRO right into the action itself – part of the story as we become one with it and it informs our choices, our imagination and behavior. That 40s generation fell into this so completely and so subconsciously – the mothers of my generation were consumed with a carefully constructed idea of womanhood and how it meant to be “glamorous”. Wonderful piece, Anna